Cancer News
Air Pollution: Lung cancer in non-smokers on the rise
Air pollution is becoming a leading cause of lung cancer deaths globally
The World Health Organization’ s( WHO) cancer agency reported in early February that air pollution plays a major role in lung cancer in non-smokers, with the number of cases on the rise. It notes that air pollution causes approximately seven million premature deaths each year and an estimated one in every nine deaths globally.
According to the World Air Quality report, Africa and Central and South Asia, regions with worsening air quality exacerbated by climate change, bore the brunt of the world’ s most severe air pollution. The largest burden of lung cancer attributable to air pollution, however, was found in East Asia, particularly China.
Lung cancer in never-smokers is also occurring almost exclusively as adenocarcinoma, a cancer that forms in the breast, lung, esophagus, stomach, colon, rectum, pancreas, prostate, and uterus. This cancer is now the most dominant of the four main subtypes of the disease in both men and women globally.
The WHO’ s International Agency for Research on Cancer( IARC) found that about 200,000 cases of adenocarcinoma were associated with exposure to air pollution in 2022. In the same year, men accounted for 1.5 million new cases of lung cancer worldwide, while women made up 908,630 new cases.
“ Air pollution can be considered an important factor that partly explains the emerging predominance of adenocarcinoma, which accounts for 53 % to 70 % of cases of lung cancer among people who have never smoked worldwide,” the study reported.
Alcohol labels should warn of cancer risk
Researchers call for more education and warning labels about the dangers of alcohol
new report from WHO / Europe, Alcohol health
A warning labels: a public health perspective for Europe, calls for mandatory, standardised labeling on alcoholic beverages.
Currently, only three of the EU’ s 27 member countries and 13 of the 53 WHO European Region Member States are implementing the health warning labels. A study conducted across 14 European Region countries reported a significant awareness gap, with only 15 percent of respondents knowing that alcohol causes breast cancer and just 39 percent aware of its link to colon cancer.
Ireland stands out among EU member states in taking the lead in placing cancer warnings on all alcoholic beverage labels, effective May 2026, making it the first country in the EU and the second country worldwide( after South Korea) to introduce such warnings on alcohol products. In South Korea, however, the manufacturers can opt to apply alternative labels that do not mention cancer on their products.
Separately, in January 2025, the US Surgeon General issued an advisory on alcohol consumption and cancer risk, recommending that health warning labels be updated on alcoholic beverages.
The 2022-30 WHO Global Alcohol Action Plan similarly called on member states to“ ensure appropriate consumer protection measures through development and implementation of labelling requirements for alcoholic beverages that display essential information for health protection.”
The EU has commissioned reports sharing the same conclusion: cancer warning labels, if properly designed, will be an effective way to inform consumers about the carcinogenic properties of alcohol. Europe’ s Beating Cancer Plan had also set a target of achieving a relative reduction of at least 10 percent in alcohol consumption by 2025.
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